Huge Diamond Deposits Revealed In Russia 243
An anonymous reader writes with this excerpt from the Christian Science Monitor: "'Russia has just declassified news that will shake world gem markets to their core: the discovery of a vast new diamond field containing 'trillions of carats,' enough to supply global markets for another 3,000 years. The Soviets discovered the bonanza back in the 1970s beneath a 35-million-year-old, 62-mile diameter asteroid crater in eastern Siberia known as Popigai Astroblem. They decided to keep it secret, and not to exploit it, apparently because the USSR's huge diamond operations at Mirny, in Yakutia, were already producing immense profits in what was then a tightly controlled world market."
Re:And how will this (Score:5, Informative)
Re:And how will this (Score:5, Informative)
Here is an informative article, a must-read if you're interested in diamonds. It's old (written in 1982) but everything still applies. In fact it's amazing that the public still hasn't gotten wise to the diamond racket in the 30 years since the article.
http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1982/02/have-you-ever-tried-to-sell-a-diamond/304575/1/?google_editors_picks=true [theatlantic.com]
Popigai crater: Origin and distribution of diamond (Score:5, Informative)
A peer reviewed paper describing the occurrence is here (paywalled):
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/j.1945-5100.1998.tb01639.x/abstract
The diamonds are ~0.2-0.5mm, elongate or tabular layered grains. They are sometimes colorless but often are yellow, grey, or black. Rarely there are diamonds which reach 10mm found in the alluvial gravel.
If the deposit is as rich as the article claims it looks like an excellent source for industrial diamonds, although given how fractured they are it won't change the gem diamond market much.
Re:Good News (Score:4, Informative)
This isn't really news, Canada has large diamond depots [nrcan.gc.ca] in the far north as well. Most are in production now, we've got several others that were discovered under the permafrost as well but they're not being mined. They're even larger than the ~28million metric ton Victor Pit open mine.
Re:Industrial quality? (Score:5, Informative)
To be even more specific, let me translate a quote from one of the scientists involved (source [www.ria.ru]):
"This isn't even diamond. The hardness of this phase (lonsdalite) is 1.54 higher than that of diamond, and here we have nanometer-sized crystals of cubic diamonds and lonsdalite - it's a very viscous matrix, which is what defines the extraordinary qualities of the Popygay impactite. The proportion of lonsdalite in some of these samples is as high as 70%."
Also, according to the same article, the market price of those crystals is estimated as $2-2.5 per carat. For comparison, jewelry-grade diamonds go for thousands of dollars per carat.
Re:And how will this (Score:5, Informative)
DeBeers had an office in the US. They used to own the diamond mine [craterofdi...tepark.com] down in Arkansas. But due to the Apartheid thing, and the price fixing, they were forced out, and on the way out they dynamited the diamond mine rather than leave an operation working mine. Almost all the diamonds coming out of Diamond Crater are gem quality. The Star of Arkansas came from there. A beautiful colored diamond.
Re:And how will this (Score:5, Informative)
That article is an excerpt from Epstein's book The Diamon Invention, which is available in full online [edwardjayepstein.com] on the author's website. It's an amazing read.
Re:And how will this (Score:4, Informative)
No they don't. http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/1982/02/have-you-ever-tried-to-sell-a-diamond/304575/ [theatlantic.com]
Short version: If you try to *sell* diamonds, you quickly discover they're now worth a fraction of what they where "worth" when you where the buyer. This is true to some degree with everything ofcourse, but to a much larger degree with diamonds than with other valuables such as precious metals.